


Sometimes Sex Alarms Me

by solrosan



Series: Safety in Numbers [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Asexual Sherlock, Complicated Relationships, Established Relationship, Failed Sexual Encounter, M/M, Multi, Sexual Boundaries, Threesome - M/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-07
Updated: 2014-03-09
Packaged: 2018-01-14 23:17:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1282360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/solrosan/pseuds/solrosan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Occasionally Sherlock joins Greg and John in bed. Sometimes it doesn’t end very well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> ~~My main excuse is red wine.~~ This is my first attempt to broach the subject of negotiation of sexual activity in a relationship where one party is asexual.

Time seemed to have come to a halt, just like everything else. The room – the bed – which just moments ago had been filled with passionate energy and heat was now still and quiet, the only sound being their low panting. Sherlock had rolled over on his back, pressing his hands against his eyes as he tried to force his heart rate and breathing down to normal. Greg and John looked at each other in understanding and with that weary disappointment they had silently vowed to never show Sherlock.

“I’m sorry,” Sherlock mumbled when his breathing was almost calm again and got out of the bed. He snatched his red dressing gown off the floor without putting it on, leaving the door opened as he walked out of the room.

Greg and John let him go without a word. They looked at each other, John shrugged and Greg shook his head, there wasn’t much to say. It wasn’t new – or unusual, though it had been a while since last time – that Sherlock walked out in the middle of sex and their most important bedroom-rule was that as soon as Sherlock said ‘no’ or ‘stop’ or in any way withdrew consent it was All Hands Off. Everything and Right Away. In the past they had tried to stop him from leaving, promising that they would just go to sleep, but experience had taught them that he never wanted to stay. Instead they raised their hands for a quick Rock-Paper-Scissors match to see who was going to go and check on him. On the third try John’s paper covered Greg’s rock and with a sigh John kissed Greg.

“I’ll be back,” he said, smiling wearily as he got up. “Feel free to finish.”

Greg made a face at the idea, making John’s smile less weary as he tried to find his bathrobe. Unlike Sherlock he put it on before leaving the bedroom.

“I’m all right,” Sherlock said as soon as John stepped into the sitting room. He was sitting on the sofa with his face in his hands, the dressing gown tightly closed around him now.

“Do you need anything?”

“No.” Sherlock took a deep breath and met John’s eyes, looking just as wrecked as he always did after abruptly withdrawing consent. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” John said. He nodded in the direction of the sofa to ask if he could sit. Sherlock nodded as well, but went back to hiding his face in his hands as John sat down. 

They sat in silence at either ends of the sofa, Sherlock still trying to calm down and regain some control and John picking his fingernails, waiting for some sort of signal from Sherlock. John found it incredibly hard to just sit there, but at least they had a script to follow these days which made it that much easier. Through negotiations, trial and error, and what felt like constant re-negotiations and uncomfortable talks they had figured out a way to deal with this situation. It wasn’t perfect yet, none of them would argue that it was, but it worked without anyone falling to pieces or getting angry.

Finally Sherlock took a deep breath and looked up from his hands. “I’m going to take a shower,” he said, turning to John. “Go back upstairs, I think Greg is about thirty seconds from coming down too.”

“You coming back up after the shower?”

Sherlock shook his head. “I’ll sleep in my bed.”

“Okay,” John said, taking Sherlock’s hand for a moment. “I love you.”

Sherlock squeezed his hand once but didn’t say anything else before going to the bathroom. John waited until he heard the shower running before he walked upstairs. Greg was already on his way out of bed when John came back to the bedroom and John couldn’t help smiling.

“Shower and bed,” he said as he walked up to Greg and kissed his forehead. 

“Did you ask what happened?”

“No,” John said, tracing Greg’s neck with his fingers. “I just think it was… you know.”

“Yeah.” Greg pulled him closer. “You okay?”

John sighed. “Yes. You?”

“I’m fine,” Greg mumbled, slowly untying John’s bathrobe so that he could rest his head against John’s belly. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

They both sighed, there weren’t much more to say. John kept stroking Greg’s neck, treasuring being able to touch him. Sherlock claimed that it was fine by him if they continued to have sex after he left, sometimes he even encouraged them to, but having one of your partners flee the bedroom was a real mood killer and the idea of picking up where they’d left always felt very foreign. That didn’t mean that they didn’t appreciate the closeness and they had never quite figured out why Sherlock didn’t want it – when they both needed it – after something like this happened.

So they remained as they were, silently waiting to hear Sherlock turn off the shower and close his bedroom door. 

Hoping and wishing that it wouldn’t take too long.


	2. Chapter 2

Sherlock leaned heavily against the bathroom door, staring at the opposite wall. The damned adrenaline was ebbing away and his knees were starting to feel very weak. He knew John was probably still in the sitting room waiting to hear him step into the shower, but Sherlock couldn’t face getting undressed again quite yet. He still pushed away from the door and turned on the shower to let John – and subsequently Greg – know that he was all right. Then he sat down on the toilet and once again hid his face in his hands.

He sobbed, felling utterly ridiculous for his reaction but he knew he would feel better afterwards if he just let his body react the way it needed to and go through the motions of stress and, well, shock. Being able to break down in private eased the embarrassment slightly, but not completely.

The shower slowly turned the bathroom into a steambath, warming Sherlock from the outside-in and making it easier to breathe calmly. When he stood up he looked at the misty mirror, pleased to only see himself as a blur and not be forced to meet his red eyes. He dropped the dressing gown on the floor and stepped into the shower. The warm water was soothing and he took a moment to just stand there before he started to carefully clean himself. He hadn’t figured out what he tried to wash away – partly due to the fact that he didn’t dare exploring that train of thought – but he compulsively felt like he had to.

When he turned off the shower he had lost all sense of time. He felt disturbingly empty and still embarrassed, but calm. He wrapped himself in the dressing gown again and went to bed without taking it off. At first his bed was cold and he curled up under the covers, covering his head, to keep the warmth from the shower. The cold, well-straightened sheets were a perfect contrast to the warm, tangled mess he had left upstairs, increasing his sense of security. His bed was for sleeping and only sleeping. 

And only for him.

He lay awake, completely hidden under the covers, for a long time, thinking about if the other two had gone to sleep yet and what would come about tomorrow.


	3. Chapter 3

Greg was the first one up in the morning, he always was, and had already started making breakfast when John made his way downstairs.

“Morning,” Greg said over his shoulder.

John smiled at him, shooting a glance towards Sherlock’s closed door.

“Not a sound,” Greg answered the unspoken question. John shrugged and started to clear out the table in the sitting room so he would be able to lay it later. They were dressed already, even though John was still barefoot, which rarely happened before breakfast on Sundays but both of them knew why: they wanted to put as much distance between themselves and last night as possible and were eager to jump ahead to when things went back to normal again.

Half-way through their breakfast Sherlock came out, wearing the dressing gown he had slept in. Sherlock muttered a reply to their greetings and went straight to boil some more water. He struggled to convince himself to take his tea to the sitting room and not just go back with it to the bedroom. When the tea was made and he couldn’t stall much longer he slowly made his way to the sitting room and sat down in his armchair rather than at the table. Greg held out the breadbasket to him and after a moment of consideration Sherlock took a toast. It was cold, obviously, but it was all right to nibble on as an awkward silence stretched between them.

“Sherlock…?” John said tentatively after a while.

Sherlock sighed. “I don’t know.” 

“Are you sure?” Greg asked.

Sherlock nodded. He didn’t know what had made him react last night and it was the most frustrating and disappointing answer there was. For all of them. There was absolutely nothing to fix, nothing to change, nothing to improve. It had been one of those times when nothing or everything had been triggering and he couldn’t pinpoint what had started it.

“But you’re okay?”

“Yes,” Sherlock said without hesitation, but then he frowned slightly. “Are… are you?”

Greg and John looked surprised at him.

“Yes.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Good,” Sherlock said, a bit surprised himself that he had asked that question. 

They looked at each other all three, none of them knowing what more to say but the silence wasn't even remotely as awkward anymore. John was the first one to turn away, picking up his newspaper, and the other followed his lead. They might all be a little bit bruised, but nothing that would lead to any lasting damage and that was very comforting knowing.


End file.
